


Just Because

by letitout



Category: Dimension 20 (Web Series), Fantasy High
Genre: Angst, F/F, one day i will be able to write fluff, today is not that day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-16
Updated: 2019-12-16
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:26:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21815146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/letitout/pseuds/letitout
Summary: Tracker forgets how to love Kristen. Kristen has doubt.
Relationships: Kristen Applebees/Tracker
Comments: 5
Kudos: 48





	Just Because

**Author's Note:**

> I know things that you don't know / All my thoughts I'll never show / Not because I'm unprepared / Not because I'm somewhat scared / Just because I love you - Lizzy McAlpine, Just Because

The problem starts just after combat. 

“Don’t come near me!” Tracker yells. She’s got a hand pointed Kristen, a spell ready at her fingertips. She backs away from Kristen, her whole body withdrawn, defensive. Her eyes are wild and her hair is tousled, stuck to her forehead with sweat. Kristen has never seen Tracker like this. She seems unhinged. Kristen takes a step towards her. 

“Hey, what’s going-”

“I’m serious!” Tracker screams, and Kristen freezes. There’s something here she’s missing. This isn’t just a fear spell. This is something else. Tracker looks ready to attack, or flee, or both. Her whole body heaves as she pants. 

“Tracker, something’s wrong, I just need-” Once again, Kristen is cut off by Tracker, who stares at her. 

“How do you know my name?” Tracker says. 

A horrible chill runs down Kristen’s spine. No, no, no. She looks into Tracker’s eyes. There’s no recognition. 

“Where the fuck am I?” Tracker says, her voice drowned in desperation and fear, “And who the fuck are you?” 

-

The facts are these, as told by Jawbone: Tracker remembers everything up to a certain point. She remembers Jawbone, and being diagnosed with lycanthropy. She remembers being kicked out of her home and dropping out of school. She remembers a few things after that, though hazy: going to nightclubs, worshipping the moon. Then everything goes blank. A big, Kristen sized black-hole. 

“They’ll come back though, right?” Kristen asks, her arms folded over her chest. She could do with a hug, “Her memories?” 

Jawbone doesn’t say anything. His silence does the talking. Kristen slumps back against the wall. The small part of her chest that was still clinging to hope diminishes like a snubbed candle. Kristen was willing to wait. She was willing to sit by Tracker’s bed and piece everything together. They’d look back at this time as a fond memory in years to come.  _ Hey, remember when you totally forgot about me for a while there? How crazy was that? _

This isn’t the end, though, Kristen decides. They can build everything back up again. And hey, maybe things will come back to Tracker one day. Time is the best medicine. 

Kristen heads towards Tracker’s door, but she is met by Jawbone placing a hand on her shoulder, stopping her. 

“I’m sorry, kiddo,” Jawbone says, his lips pressed together in a tight smile, “She’s pretty shaken up. She’ll come out in her own time.” 

“Oh,” Kristen says, “Oh, yeah sure.”

Kristen turns and leaves. 

-

Tracker comes down for breakfast the next morning. She regards the table as if it were a bomb, and not a piece of furniture adorned with Jawbone’s signature pancakes. Tracker surveys each and every piece of the scene, before silently drawing out a chair and sitting down. She catches Kristen watching and stares at her. 

“When did you get here?” Tracker asks directly. Kristen blinks. 

“Good morning, I, uh, live here,” Kristen says. 

Tracker pauses to process this. 

“You… live here?” Tracker says. Her tone is careful, but there’s unease and discomfort threaded within it, and Kristen feels a pang in her chest. Kristen blinks a few times. She’s not going to cry at breakfast- she won’t let herself. Tracker’s eyes widen. 

“Sorry- I didn’t mean it in a rude way,” Tracker backpedals, “It’s just sort of. Forward.”

“My parents kicked me out,” Kristen says, “I didn’t really have anywhere else to live.” 

“Oh,” Tracker says, shifting in her seat, “Same here. I mean, my parents kicked me out, too.”

“I know,” Kristen says slowly, “You told me.” 

Tracker stares at her, and then back at her plate. They eat their food in silence, until Kristen, suddenly feeling claustrophobic, dumps her food and walks out. 

-

Tracker is sitting on the couch, watching a rerun of an episode of  _ Ship’s Mate _ . Kristen and Tracker had binged the show together a few months prior. It was one of those things that they poked fun off, in a  _ it’s so bad it’s good  _ sort of way. Kristen takes a step forward, uneasily clutching a box. 

Tracker looks up, and then her eyes flicker back to the TV. 

“Oh, hey,” She says. Kristen thinks that maybe indifference is worse that unrecognition. 

“Hey, I remember this episode,” Kristen says, clinging desperately to anything they may still have in common. 

“You’ve watched this before?” Tracker asks. 

Kristen stays silent. She doesn’t know how to answer. How can she?  _ Yeah, actually. So have you. You watched it with me. We lay in your bed and you held my hand and you traced circles with your thumb on my skin. I couldn’t focus on most of the episodes because you were next to me. We had it on it the background, actually, the fifth time you told me you loved me. I know it’s lame to keep track, but those kind of things just feel important to me. I didn’t get the chance to ask if they’re important to you, too.  _

“Yeah, I think I caught it on TV a while back,” Kristen says, and then clearing her throat, her fingers digging into the box so hard that the skin around her knuckles goes white, “I have some photos of us. I thought we could take a look.” 

Tracker looks at Kristen. Kristen can see Tracker trying to hide her displeasure of this suggestion. How easy would it be, to put the box down and run away, never knowing if Tracker wanted to look? But Kristen has a plan, and she needs to go through with it. It’s simply the way she operates- try every solution until one sticks. She can’t back down now. 

Kristen walks over and sits on the sofa, making sure to leave a gap so that Tracker doesn’t feel like she’s being invaded. It’s all a careful game; Kristen takes one step forward, Tracker takes one step back. Kristen hopes that maybe if she too takes one step back, Tracker will come forward and meet her in the middle. 

Kristen pulls out a photo, and hands it over to Tracker, who stares at the image. Her eyebrows knit together. Kristen really loves Tracker’s eyebrows. She loves how they move when she laughs, or how she doesn’t pluck them because, in Tracker’s words, life’s too short to give a shit whether or not there’s space between her damn eyebrows. 

“Do you-” Kristen hates this. She hates how every word feels like a ceramic bowl, ready to slip through her hands and shatter, “Do you remember anything? Does it jog any memories?” 

Tracker bites her lip, and slowly shakes her head. She looks in the box, and pulls out another one. And another, and another. Her expression does not seem to change. 

“I’m sorry,” Tracker says, “It’s just so freaky.” 

Kristen waits for Tracker to continue, hands in her lap, scared that if she moves, or talks, Tracker will take flight and leave her alone with a box of stupid photos. Kristen is briefly tempted to burn them. She sees herself in a photo, mocking her with a smile, an arm around Tracker, flaunting their relationship. 

“It’s so weird seeing myself. But that’s not me- or I guess it is me. There’s just this big… block, in my brain, where I guess all this stuff is. But right now, it’s like I never lived any of this. It’s like watching myself through a screen, you know?” Tracker says. Of course, Kristen doesn’t know, but she nods anyway. 

They lapse into silence, and Kristen focuses on the TV. She tries to train her brain to be unaware of Tracker sitting next to her. She tries to forget the weight of Tracker’s legs when they’re sprawled out on her lap, or the exact pitch of her voice when she whines for Kristen to bring her snacks. Maybe, if Kristen hit her head enough, she’d forget everything too. The option seems tempting when compared with her current reality. This is a special form of torture. 

A character on screen, Julian, makes a particularly crude joke, and Kristen winces. 

“He’s such a dick,” Kristen mutters. 

“Really?” Tracker says, her voice suddenly perking up, “I think he’s great. I like his dry sense of humour.” 

Kristen stares at Tracker, “You hate Julian.” 

Tracker looks up at Kristen, incredulous, “What? No I don’t. He’s one of my favourite characters.” 

“No way! You said you hated him. You had this whole rant about how he shouldn’t need to use shock for humour, and you said that-” Kristen trails off as she watches Tracker’s jaw set. She is fighting a useless fight. She is making a point for a Tracker that no longer exists. 

“I’m going to get something to eat,” Tracker says flatly, and leaves Kristen on the sofa with the box of photos. Kristen picks one up, and tears it to little pieces, and then tilts her hand, watching the shredding flutter to the ground. 

-

Kristen forgets herself in the grogginess of 2am. She stumbles over to Tracker’s door, knocking in the pattern they use exclusively for each other. There’s a pause, and then the door swings open. 

“Oh,” Tracker says, unable to hide the surprise on her face, “Kristen. It’s really late. Is something wrong?”

“I-” Kristen stops herself. Things start to patch together in her brain.  _ Not your Tracker. She doesn’t remember. Go back to bed.  _

“Did you need something? Sorry, I’m just pretty tired,” Tracker says apologetically. 

Kristen wraps her arms around herself, trying to find comfort in the feeling of her own hands, “Sorry, force of habit. You and I used to cuddle if one of us couldn’t sleep.”

“Oh,” Tracker says, and shifts her weight from one foot to the other. She holds the door like a shield, blocking Kristen out. “I don’t really think I’d be totally comfortable with that, if I’m honest.” 

Kristen remembers telling Tracker how much she loved her for her honesty. Funny, that, how the things you once fell in love with a person for can twist and shift until they’re unrecognisable.

“That’s fine,” Kristen says, her voice coming out higher than she expected, and then, trying to smooth it out, “I wouldn’t want to make you uncomfortable.” 

Tracker stands at the doorway with a strained smile. Kristen can feel that she has overstayed her welcome, and takes a step back. 

“Well then. Goodnight, and sorry,” She says, and then, without thinking, “I love you.”

Tracker pauses, and then closes the door. Kristen stands in the silence for a moment, tries to make peace with it, and when she realises she can’t, she heads back to bed. 

-

“I don’t get it,” Tracker says, holding up the pamphlet that she had co-designed for the Church of  _ Yes?  _

The two of them are alone in the kitchen. Adaine and Fig have gone to do homework, which essentially means Adaine writes two different papers while Fig disrupts her, and Jawbone and Sandralynn have left to fetch groceries. 

“Why would anyone worship doubt?” Tracker asks, handing the brochure back to Kristen. 

“I don’t know,” Kristen says, “I guess the one thing in my life that was always consistent was doubt. It got me through a lot. It helped me see a lot.” 

“Weird,” Tracker says, and refocuses her attention on the granola bar she had put down. 

“I mean, I don’t know. You actually, you helped me set up a lot of it. Our first follower actually joined because of you. And the missionary stuff we did was really cool, you should see our-”

“Kristen?” 

“Yeah?” 

Tracker slides off the counter and stands in front of Kristen. Tracker still smells the same. She smells of her soap and her incense- the type she uses when she’s worshipping her Goddess. 

“Kristen, I’m enjoying getting to know you. Or getting to know you again, I guess. But if I could just ask for one favour- please try and see this from my point of view. There is no  _ our  _ from where I’m standing. It hurts to see you and know that we had something. But that person, whoever she was, if she ever comes back, had reasons for loving you that I don’t have right now,” Tracker says. 

Kristen tries not to think back to the first time they met. She tries not to think about Tracker calling her cute, or buying her a drink, or kissing her. If only it were as easy to forget as it is to remember. 

“I know, I know. I know it’s going to take time-”

“Kristen?”

Kristen stops, mid-sentence. 

“Kristen. I don’t entirely know how to say this, but I need you to understand that it happened once, and I’m really lucky to have experienced that in some way, at some time. But just because it happened once doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to happen again. I’m sorry. I really am sorry, Kristen. You seem lovely. It’s just a bit much,” Tracker says, “I wish I could love you. I do. I just… don’t.” 

Kristen recognises the way Tracker is speaking. It’s her  _ I’ll let this follower down gently  _ voice. She used to use it for people who came to the church seeking definitive answers, and they’d share a look after Tracker was done, an inside joke passing between them, a,  _ haha, can you imagine?  _

Tracker doesn’t know that Kristen understands what that voice means. And it’s then that it hits Kristen that maybe doubt isn’t going to help in this situation. She needs an answer, and it’s looking like  _ no  _ more than  _ yes?  _

“Right,” Kristen says, “Right, well, I think I need to head out.”

She stares at Tracker, unsure of how to say goodbye. She cannot kiss, or touch, or hug. A handshake seems too formal. 

“Right, well. It was good,” Kristen says. Tracker smiles sadly at her. 

“Hey, I’m sure it was. Past me was a lucky girl,” Tracker says. 

Kristen turns away before she can begin to cry in front of Tracker. She doesn’t know where she’s going, and she doesn’t think she ever will. But Kristen does what she knows best. She walks and she walks and she walks. Without a clear path in sight, she keeps going. 

**Author's Note:**

> I love Trackerbees with all my heart and soul, so I wrote angst about them, naturally. This was just a quick thing I wrote while I work through something much longer!


End file.
